30 Jan A mile in their moccasins? Understanding client experience touchpoints

Do you know what it’s like to walk a mile in your client’s moccasins?  Delivering an excellent client experience starts with developing an understanding of your client’s approach, perception and experience of your practice at each and every one of the many different client experience touch-points – where your client has some experience of you or your practice.

Understanding what these touch-points are, how your clients respond at each stage and how it influences their perceptions and experience is vital to crafting strategies for marketing, business development, matter management and client relationship management.

It starts early.

Do you understand where clients hear about you and what they hear? Do you try and influence this through cultivating ‘referral messages’. Do you discuss referral messaging with your professional referral partners? Do you monitor client satisfaction to assess what they might be likely to say to others about you?

First impressions matter and these early client experience touch-points – where prospective clients first hear about you – are incredibly powerful in influencing whether these prospects are converted into clients and whether they enjoy a positive client experience with your practice.

It doesn’t stop at the referral of course. Different prospects will take different journeys but they might look online for information about you. They might ask others about you. If they feel good about what they see or hear (and yes it is a feeling!), they might then call you up. What happens then? Does that call feel good to them too?

Do you understand these early client experience touch-points? Do you then seek to influence or manage them?

Some typical client experience touch-points

Client experience touch-points: understanding + investment = results

Delivering a positive client experience at each of the potential customer/client touch-points doesn’t come naturally and takes more than good intentions.  It requires understanding (research?), skills development, process development, ongoing monitoring and a constant battle against complacency.